Vestas lays off 30% of Windsor plant workforce

Vestas Wind Systems on Thursday laid off about 30 percent of its workers at its wind turbine blade factory in Windsor, according to sources — the latest in a series of reductions at Vestas plants in Colorado.

Before Thursday, Vestas officials had said about 700 people worked there; 30 percent of 700 is 210.

The blades plant was the Danish company’s first manufacturing plant in the United States; it opened in Colorado in 2008.

In an emailed statement, Vestas officials did not specify how many workers were let go at the Windsor factory, but said that the Danish company’s manufacturing workforce at four plants in Colorado has decreased from more than 1,700 to about 1,200 people this year, through attrition, relocations and reductions.

Vestas also runs a towers plant in Pueblo and two plants, making wind turbine blades and nacelles, in Brighton.

On Tuesday, Vestas laid off about 80 workers at its blade factory in Brighton. Before that, Vestas cut an estimated 30 people at its nacelles plant in Brighton on Aug. 20. And on Aug. 13, Vestas cut nearly 100 people from its plant in Pueblo.

"Vestas made a big investment in Colorado to establish a regional manufacturing presence that created many American jobs during an economic recession," the company's statement said. "Vestas’ four Colorado factories will continue to manufacture wind turbine components for the U.S. market, as well as export to Canada and Latin America."

Both of Colorado’s U.S. senators, Mark Udall and Michael Bennet — who have been pushing Congress to extend a federal tax credit for wind energy — issued statements Thursday decrying Vestas’ latest round of layoffs.

Vestas officials — as well as Udall and Bennet — have blamed the U.S. market slowdown — and its layoffs in Colorado — on the pending expiration of a federal wind Production Tax Credit (PTC) on Dec. 31. It pays wind farm operators about $22 for every megawatt of electricity generated.

Udall said the layoffs illustrated the need for Congress to extend the wind PTC, which so far has not happened. President Barack Obama supports extending the credit; challenger Mitt Romney opposes it.

“The wind Production Tax Credit supports middle-class families across Colorado and the country,” Udall said in a news release. “Those jobs — and our long-term economic and energy security — depend on American manufacturing and Made-in-America energy. Congress’s failure to quickly extend the PTC is pushing this promising industry backwards, costing hard-working Coloradans their jobs. Nonetheless, I remain committed to working with colleagues from both sides of the aisle to immediately extend the PTC as soon as Congress returns to Washington.”

“The continued stream of layoffs of Colorado wind energy workers is especially disappointing because they could have been avoided if Congress had passed the wind PTC,” Bennet said in his own statement. “Congress’ inaction is hitting home in Colorado. It’s unnecessarily making it harder for families to buy groceries, put gas in their cars and pay their bills. The wind tax credit has bipartisan support and should be extended as soon as soon as possible.”

The company has said it’s responding to a worldwide slowdown in the wind turbine market, and also to a dramatic slowdown in U.S. orders.

In August, Vestas announced it would cut an additional 1,400 jobs around the world by year-end to cut costs, on top of the 2,335 positions it already said it would cut.

In Thursday's statement, the company said that "although Vestas added many jobs in service and construction to meet customer and market demands this year, overall the company reduced its workforce in the U.S. and Canada by about 20 percent in 2012 — from more than 3,400 employees to about 2,600 today. Affected positions in 2012 include those in manufacturing, sales, service, supply chain, and research and development."

Despite the Vestas layoffs and problems at other renewable-energy companies in Colorado, economic-development officials have said the state’s investment in alternative energy will be a good one in the long run.

“The question that we, as a country, have to ask ourselves is whether we’ll be a global competitor or walk away from it,” Tom Clark, CEO of the Metro Denver Economic Development Corp., said in July.

“We, here in Colorado, think that walking away in the short term might be attractive to some people but not to us. It’s like climbing Everest when you get to the last way station and things start to go badly. Some walk down; we want to summit.”